I am a drinker. I’m not out of control or anything, but I can say I like to put them away more so than the average guy. I like to have a good time. I like to party. I have friends that like to party and they have friends that like to party. I indulge in the activity of drinking at least once a week but most likely more than that. I have noticed that most social gatherings, when you are in your twenties, has to do with drinking and most of the time it has to do with drinking a lot. Sometimes more than others, but most of the time it’s enough to make you take a cab home. Society today really embraces drinkers so everyone seems fine with the idea of “going out for some drinks after work”. That’s just the way it is. I didn’t really see the whole extremity of the situation until I decided to stop drinking for a month. It’s almost strange how it is so natural to drink when “going out” or when “hanging out with friends”. It’s just what we do and the way things are. And we all know that people stick with what they know and what seems comfortable.

I can’t take credit for the idea of giving drinking a break. Though it seems like a simple concept, I hadn’t met anyone who had actually considered doing it until I met Priscilla’s good friend Meghann Quirk. She gave up drinking for Lent a couple years in a row before I had decided to partake. This was about two years ago now. I didn’t really quit because I gave myself three “give me’s”. Three days that I could drink within the six weeks that I couldn’t. It made it a lot easier and it more than made up for the days I didn’t drink by getting plastered the days I could. By the end of it, I did feel a small sense of accomplishment, but it was short lived.

This time I didn’t give myself any free days. I set a time to start and a time to finish. It just happened to start on my friend Dennis’ Bachelor Party and ended on his wedding day. It seemed fitting since I knew I would be drinking heavily at the Bachelor Party and then again at the wedding. The four weekends in between were uneventful unplanned weekends without traveling, or guests, or parties, or birthdays or holidays. With nothing to stand in my way, I knew it would be the easiest time to be successful. Is that cheating? Maybe a little, but I still had my hardships and those four weekends filled up pretty quickly with drinking events.

Right off the bat I had a run in with temptation. I joined a kickball league with friends that had games every Tuesday night after work. The games were sometimes followed by dinner and drinks at a local Pizza joint Mellow Mushroom. I drank my water and ate my pizza. It was harmless. Nobody really got wasted so it wasn’t that hard. That weekend Priscilla and I went to a concert to see Rascal Flatts. (A gift from me to her for our Anniversary) We tailgated and everything. I watched Priscilla try to down as many beers as she could in the four hours we were there. It was pretty entertaining to try to get her drunk. That was until the ride home when she complained the entire ride about how she had the hiccups and wanted to throw up. All in all it was still fun though.

The following weekend was uneventful. A weekend of rest and being lame. We stayed in both nights. The weekend after that was looking to be a challenge though. We were visited by Priscilla’s college friend Michele and her husband Jake. I thought I would have some long nights at the bar in front of me being miserable the whole time. I lucked out though because they were ready for bed after dinner each night. Now don’t get me wrong, they had plenty of wine and drinks through dinner as most people do, they just didn’t want to get crazy and stay up all hours of the night. I wasn’t complaining.

Then the last weekend came a visit from the in-laws. This doesn’t seem like it would be hard, but they do drink so it is was present. Plus, a few drinks while the in-laws are around makes everything a little easier to withstand. The weekend was fun and we filled it with shopping and cooking. It wasn’t bad at all.

So now the wedding and the cutoff date is slowly approaching. Only a couple more days left. It really hasn’t been hard. People wouldn’t understand when I would explain I wasn’t drinking. They mostly would give me a strange look like, “what a weirdo”. Everyone would ask me, “why are you not drinking?” I would always answer, “Just for Fun” but the real answer is that I just wanted to take a break from something I do all the time. A break from something that isn’t good for me and something I most likely should cut back on doing. I still like to drink and I think I will most likely will be getting pretty drunk at the wedding this weekend, but I do plan on cutting back when I start back at it. Not completely, but maybe through this experience I can have a better perspective on how much I drink. But especially how much I drink cause everyone else does.

UPDATE: I drank the day before the wedding cause I counted the days and it had already been 32 days. So I had a couple to get my liver ready for the wedding the next night. The wedding came and went and yes, I drank enough to get drunk. It was a good time. By Monday I was sick as a dog and had to miss work cause I had a fever. Hooray for alcohol.

Priscilla and I bought a house in March of this year. It is a suburbanized home in Smyrna right outside of Atlanta, Georgia. We took our time to find the right one. We worked with a mortgage broker and determined how much we can afford and how big of a loan we can get.  In turn we would know how much house we could buy. Priscilla and I got a kick ass deal on the two story, three bedroom house in Atlanta. The economy told us it was the best time to buy with the home prices and interest rates being at an all time low. We dove in head first and bought our first home. I had saved up some money from freelancing and had a chunk of money from my late grandparents inheritance so we used that money as a down payment and to do some much needed renovations to the house. When we finally moved in we were in a good place financially. We had a great house with money still in the bank. We were happy.

It has been almost 6 months since we have been home owners and the time seems like it has just flew by. Since March we have made several improvements to our new home, some of which we knew about going into it and some we didn’t. When the weather started to turn hot and humid as Atlanta normally does come summer, we noticed that our upstairs bedrooms and closet never seemed to cool down the way they should. I didn’t want to believe we had an issue with our air conditioning, so I put off calling the repair crew as long as possible. Now, we got extremely lucky these first couple of months of owning our first home. The air conditioning needed a new compressor and that was looking to cost over $1500, but our awesome real estate agent David Willard bought us a home warranty on the day we closed on the house as a wedding gift. The warranty covered the entire thing except for a $200 deductible. It was incredibly lucky and we knew it.

The warranty came in handy one other time when our water heater valve was leaking. Only a $50 deducible covered that small fix. Oh, and before the compressor was replace we spent $50 on a deductible for a guy to come replace a non-working thermostat. As you can see, things are starting to add up. We just had our new kitchen table delivered from Room Togo which is just what we needed. It fills a huge hole we had in our main living area and it was something we were planning to buy the moment we moved in. Another expense. The list of things we need to improve or fix grows by the day. Priscilla and I are both somewhat perfectionists and we need to have things a certain way. Because of this I’m sure the list will ever go away.

I love our new home. It is everything I have ever wanted in a house. It is expensive though. Very expensive. I have never been so aware of my finances as I am now. Credit Cards are the devil but they are saving my ass right now. I know things will settle down and my debt will recess, but until then I am watching every bill and pinching every penny. I guess it is good for me. I figured I would eventually have to lean on my credit one day. Living without debt is unrealistic, but I tried as long as I could. It’s a helpless feeling owing money you don’t have. I don’t like it. Not at all. But again I love my house and it’s worth every penny.

My wife Priscilla doesn’t cook.  She never has and I don’t think she ever would have either.  That is until about a month ago when we both decided to trade off days during the week when we both cook dinner.  Not a Fast Food pick up order or a pizza delivery guy.  A real home cooked meal.   Now, cooking a meal at home may seem simple to some people, but to Priscilla, cooking is a really, really big challenge.

Priscilla can clean and organise and even do yard work with all the confidence in the world.  She can take a messy closet and turn it into a rainbow of organised shirts, undershirts, button downed shirts, dress shirts and suits all in order and all color coordinated.  Don’t get in her way when she is in her “”clean mode”.  She is like a runaway train.  She will clean the house til you can eat off the kitchen floor.  I can’t even take a shower two days after she cleans cause it will dirty the tile.  (just a joke there)  She will spend hours pulling every weed in the yard after she mows and edges the grass.  It’s incredible how meticulous she can get over some of the smallest things.

Well, as domesticated as she sounds, she has never been a chef.  Apparently she has never cooked in her life.  Ever.  I, on the other hand, was a line cook in a restaurant for 5 years as I made my way through college, so I know my way around the kitchen.  Now I have always been proud of my cooking ability and have always cooked for myself and then for Priscilla when we started to date and eventually got married.  I didn’t mind then and I don’t mind now but I do want Priscilla to learn how to cook so she can appreciate the world of the Culinary Arts and try new and exciting foods.

Priscilla has always been a picky eater.  Ever since I have known her she has been very particular about what she orders off a menu and what restaurant she attends.  She is usually not  ”in the mood” for anything other than chicken fingers and quesadillas.  She has her moments of being open minded about what she eats, but most of the time she just isn’t feeling it.  The idea of having us both cook opens up the idea of making new foods and trying new things we normally wouldn’t want.  We are letting the other person choose the meal and make it the way they like.  The main thing I wanted wanted to achieve for us both was to appreciate these meals because it took time and effort to create them.

Priscilla was all for it.  She knows she is a picky eater and wanted to learn how to cook.  I would be there to help and she would be there to help me too.  So far the meals ranged from Polenta to frozen chicken fingers.  All in all, we have leanred a lot.  Eventually I want us to take some cooking classes and learn even more.  I want to try new things and cook new vegtables I now consider weird or gross.  Eggplant?  Not sure if that is good or not but I want to try it out.  Priscilla has eaten everythign I have made and cooked up some excellent things herself.  The Pulled Pork was some of the best I have ever had.